One of yesterday's Sullivans, from Dec. 4, 1966, featured Ed giving Gary Lewis (of & The Playboys) a show biz farewell as he'd been drafted into the army. I did not know that he was Jerry Lewis's son.
And this was not the first episode of the week that originally aired in December and had at least one Holiday-themed segment...here, the Supremes sing "My Favorite Things" in front of a backdrop of stacked presents.
There's a Muppets episode coming up Monday according to the commercial.
Hah, fooled ya.
It would be melancholy, but comforting.
Too bad...if you'd brought a Who record, I could have thrown in a giant clam with the island....
This is the Woodard I referred to: becoming a genuine enemy who does not write off anything not supported by his medical training.
Well, he's effectively digging his own grave now...or rather, Doc Woodard #3's....
Yep, that sexist nonsense was one of Batgirl's crimefighting tools. Not detective work or employing anything from a background in criminology (that did not exist for TV Barbara), but women's intuition. I will forever note that I cannot recall other 60s action TV characters such as Cathy Gale, Emma Peel or Honey West ever speaking in that way. Thanks, Bill Dozier.
See upthread...Eve on
Ironside was also invoking women's intuition (which she did again in this week's episode). And you missed my point...that Batgirl was only saying that as a cover for her true source of information...whereas you've long argued that she really meant it.
That said...I was just reacquainted with the Nora Clavicle episode as background viewing on H&I this morning...ye gods, that one was a terrible three steps backward...but more on that in January, I guess.
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50th Anniversary Viewing
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Mission: Impossible
"The Slave: Part I"
Originally aired October 8, 1967
Xfinity said:
The IMF is ordered to abolish the slave trade in a nation rule by a tyrannical king.
Phelps gets this week's orders from a good ol' reel-to-reel tape in a fire call box in a park.
The voice in the recording said:
This recording will self-destruct in five seconds. Good luck, Jim.
The time-filling to turn this story into a two-parter showed early on, when Jim's operative-selection scene played out at a more luxurious pace than usual, including a long moment in which Phelps contemplates over a stiff drink before bringing out the portfolio. This week's team includes a guest agent who wrote a report on slavery.
Most of this episode is set-up for the main scheme...this part mainly consists of Barney's reconnaissance of the slave jail. When time is shorter, the IMF often magically has all the intel it needs about the people and locations involved in their operations. And it sure is convenient that when the slavers jail undercover Barney, they don't search him and find all the junk he's got stashed in his robes.
If they'd wanted to do this as a one-hour episode, it seems like they could have left out the whole Phelps / Warren Stevens part of the mission; but perhaps that all comes together next week.
Other TOS guests include Joseph Ruskin, Percy Rodrigues, Antoinette Bower, and Sid Haig.
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The Man from U.N.C.L.E.
"The Prince of Darkness Affair: Part II"
Originally aired October 9, 1967
Xfinity said:
Solo infiltrates a wanted criminal's (Bradford Dillman) cult to capture his deadly weapon, the Thermal Prism.
Open Channel Dyed Solo. Casual viewers may recognize this as the episode in which Solo sports white hair to infiltrate Sebastian's cult, the Third Way. (Another crack at ABC?)
Guests include John Carradine, who's less recognizable when the plot specifically calls for him not to speak; Julie London as Sebastian's estranged wife; and Roy Jenson (Cloud William, "The Omega Glory").
The rocket that Solo stole while undercover sure wasn't a Saturn V. But launching it from inside a building vaguely reminded me of the Baxter Building.
This two-parter was released theatrically in 1968 as
The Helicopter Spies. While there was some use of helicopters in both parts, I'd hardly say that it was prominent enough to be a defining feature of the installment. In any case, this half did feel a little more cinematic in its production values than last week's episode.
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The Rat Patrol
"The Love Thine Enemy Raid"
Originally aired October 9, 1967
H&I said:
Troy accidentally shoots a German nurse during an attack on an supply convoy. The Rat Patrol must decide whether to sneak her into a nearby German field hospital or let her die and continue their mission.
Yeah, way to go there, Quickdraw. She was just peeking her head out the back of the only truck in the German convoy that they didn't manage to blow up.
I don't remember if it was a Season 1 or Season 2 episode, but this seemed like a variation on the premise of the episode with Ed Asner. They should have taken her to Ed's field hospital, he's cool with the Patrol.
There's some good tension about whether they should save the nurse when she overhears some intel about Allied tank movements. In the uncharacteristically stage-shot coda, the Patrol gets news that the Germans hadn't learned about the tanks, and wonder whether she didn't talk or didn't live.
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Batman
"A Horse of Another Color"
Originally aired October 12, 1967
H&I said:
In need of money for his parasol plan, the Penguin steals from the parasol collection at the library. Librarian Barbara Gordon alerts Batman, who uses Alfred as a ruse to trap the Penguin.
Or as Ethel would pronounce it, "A Hoss of Another Color."
Batman gets the stolen folio back within the hour, but his plan involved putting an ad in the paper...was he planning this ahead...?
We don't often see Bruce and Dick walking into the study from the Batpoles, do we?
It's odd that Batman would even think of recruiting Batgirl to be a jockey, but whatever works for the story. And nice palm trees they've got there at the Gotham Park Racetrack.
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Ironside
"The Taker"
Originally aired October 12, 1967
Xfinity said:
After a police friend is slain, Ironside finds evidence he was a blackmailer; with Robert Alda, Mark Richman.
I could tell from what we saw of her in the beginning that the killer was a woman, but putting (Peter) Mark Richman prominently in the story made for a good distraction from that. It did turn out that his character was in on the identity of the killer and helping to cover for her for personal reasons.
Here's another early first-season episode of a series that I suspect may have been the first shot. As mentioned upthread, the series premise was set up in a TV movie that aired in Spring of 1967 (which I haven't seen), but this episode had a few conspicuous tidbits of series exposition that weren't in evidence in the earlier-aired episodes...notably explaining that Ironside is a former chief of detectives who's now serving as a consultant, emphasizing his unofficial status, and dropping a reference to his assistant Mark being an ex-con (which I didn't know). Also, Mark makes a comment about having "finally made the team" when Ironside hands him a gun.
Guests include William Schallert, who does an M:I-quality accent and becomes a collateral murder victim in the cover-up of the crime being investigated.
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"Absence Makes the Heart Grow Nervous"
Originally aired October 12, 1967
Wiki said:
Before Ann goes to Philadelphia for a play that's making a nationwide tour, Donald tries to show her a good time by giving her a night on the town...and another night, and another night...
This is the first installment of a separately titled two-parter. This half is actually all about Ann and Donald going to New York. Now the characters are supposed to live there, but they use Ann going away as an excuse to see all the touristy sights in the city together...which is played as a bigger deal than it should be, because they had to take the filming across the continent. Notably, there's no dialogue in the lengthy NYC tourism collage.
Ann Marie said:
I've never been so happy about being miserable in my whole life.
The ride on the Statue of Liberty Ferry gives a view of Lower Manhattan just a year before construction began on the World Trade Center.
Ann name-drops Boston and New Haven as other venues of the play.
The NY segment includes a hippie gag, which involves Donald coming up on one who looks like Ann from behind. This had me wondering which of the shows I'm watching will give us our first full-on hippie episode.
Batman is likely, as I know there's one coming up this season.
Our two main-credits regulars are the only credited cast in the episode.
"Oh, Donald" count: 6, I think...the lag on Me's site was particularly bad this time around, which was very distracting, so I may have missed some.
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Tarzan
"The Blue Stone of Heaven: Part II"
Originally aired October 13, 1967
H&I said:
Tarzan must prevent a crazed mercenary from dynamiting an ancient burial ground and stealing a jeweled idol.
The episode starts with a recap of last week's climax of the statue being found and Colonel Takakombi declaring himself king and god. William Marshall does good megalomania. This half reemphasizes how legend has it that the idol brings its owner immortality. I sensed some irony on the horizon. There wasn't a lot happening in this episode...lots of scenes just seem to be filling time, especially those dwelling on the spectacle of the natives chanting for Takakombi while he stands on his pyramid.
We get a good bit of Tarzan and Jai acting like a well-oiled machine when the captured Tarzan creates a distraction so that Jai can sneak in and partly untie him. Another scene has Jai disguising himself by putting Cheeta on his shoulders wrapped in a sack cloth.
The underwater passage factors into the story again. Still no clam.
This week has all the same Trek guests as last week. There are also at least two characters with substantial speaking roles who go uncredited.
In the climax, Tarzan pushes the idol off the pyramid and convinces the natives that their god is a lie. Must have been a theme night on NBC.
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Star Trek
"The Apple"
Originally aired October 13, 1967
Stardate 3715.3
MeTV said:
Primitive inhabitants of Gamma Trianguli VI worship a god who orders them to kill visitors from the Enterprise.
See my post here.
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The Prisoner
"A. B. and C."
Originally aired October 13, 1967 (UK)
Wiki said:
A desperate Number Two tampers with Number Six's dreams to discover where his loyalties lie.
We have indication here that the 2's are indeed being replaced for their inability to break 6. Is this whole Village setup for the benefit of a few special cases like 6...or is he just that damn important?
This episode's premise emphasizes something that I touched upon in my review of the first one...that 6 is as much an enigma to us as the Village is.
That the Village people are so fixated on discovering who 6 may have been planning to sell out to suggests that it's not all just one big, happy global conspiracy...and that his own people are behind the Village.
The dream monitoring/manipulating tech definitely places the series in SF/F territory.
Regarding "A"...
Number 14 said:
He looks vaguely familiar.
Number 2 should have said:
Yes, we've seen him on The Avengers a couple of times.
Even in his subconscious, 6 is a stubbornly uncooperative fellow. From the trouble he manages to create on the inside, I'm getting the Rorschachy vibe that
they're trapped in there with
him.
The music at the party in the C dream sequence was pretty groovy. I saw C's identity coming when they established that 2 didn't know what "he" looked like. I also saw who D was going to be...the glasses and mustache were a little too visible through the mask.
So we seem to have established that 6 wasn't selling out his people.
Three episodes in, I have to say...this is a really engaging series. It's very effective in holding my attention, it gets my wheels turning, and the storytelling is tight and solid.
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The Avengers
"The £50,000 Breakfast"
Originally aired October 14, 1967 (UK)
Wiki said:
A Switzerland-bound ventriloquist in a coma has a bellyful of diamonds. This is a remake of episode 2.08 'Death of a Great Dane'.
This one starts off as the show a little more in its wheelhouse...a mystery with a quirky, attention-grabbing angle...but it becomes difficult to get a handle on what it's really about and focuses a bit too much on the investigatees rather than the show's main asset, the investigators. Ultimately it comes down to a butler impersonating a recently departed financier who was covertly buried in a pet cemetery. We do get a scene of Emma going toe-to-toe with a female foe who was good enough to put up a fight with her.
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Get Smart
"The Spirit Is Willing"
Originally Aired October 14, 1967
Xfinity said:
Max meets a woman who demands $50,000 for her testimony against a KAOS agent.
That description doesn't touch upon what the title refers to...that the mystery woman appears to be an already-dead witness. I guessed that the mother would really be Ann Ferris in disguise, as she was obviously wearing old age makeup. And it didn't make sense in the first place how everyone jumped to the conclusion that there was something supernatural involved, when Max could have just met somebody who was using a dead woman's name as an alias. Ina Balin was easy on the eyes, even when was she was unwigged but still made up to look weathered.
We got a bit of a coincidental pond-spanning theme night with the fake death angle.
The sight gag with Max's retracting bar was good. His apartment looked a lot different than it did...was it just last episode?
Guests include Len Lesser, who was ringing a vague bell for me...but I never would have realized without looking it up that he was the future Uncle Leo from
Seinfeld!
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Actually, that description is misleading...he lets Ann stay there while he's out of town because her apartment is being exterminated for termites. Harry drops into town on an open invitation from Donald to come stay at his place anytime, and they miss each other's calls.
